B) Give Them to Me for a Time

I looked down at the courtyard below me and at the young man standing in front of the bronze gate. I closed the door of the elevator and pressed the button for the top floor. I can barely feel any movement. I could not really tell it was moving at all except for the fact that I had pressed the UP button multiple times and it had never failed before. I hate that. His things always worked. I only needed to press it once but pressing it multiple times just made me feel somehow a little more in control. I like that. Control. Because my control leads to chaos. Chaotic control.

“Fear!” I barked. Fear looked up at me with his wide yellow eyes and nervously quivered, “Yes master?”

“Remind me to encourage that young group of so-called musicians in Block 12 of the Iowa precinct to change the name of their punk band to ‘Chaotic Control’. Then let’s arrange to have them head to StarryHost.”

“Doubt! I want you to arrange for that young radical from Los Angeles to get to StarryHost as well and to see the band perform. Make sure he meets the band afterward. Make sure some drugs and drinking happens and they start discussing science and faith. I want the band to doubt the scientific establishment and take up the cause of scientific conspiracy…you know…things like the Apollo Moon landing being fake. Chaotic Control will become a platform of doubt and dissension and anger.”

“I will try, but you know I’m never sure.” He whined. True to nature Doubt always whined, never sure he could do an assignment even though by design that was his High Calling.

“Perfect.” I affirmed him in fatherly tones. But I am the Father of Lies.

“Now let’s get ready for the Light.”

The slight vibration of the elevator stopped and the doors began to open with a slight pressurized whoosh. That’s when that God-awful light flooded into the elevator.

I stood there, momentarily paralyzed by pride, not willing to shield my eyes from HIM. Light was everywhere. Glorious, painful, all intruding, all revealing Light. It was everywhere except..inside me. In me, darkness reigns. Proud. Arrogant. Darkness. I heard Fear and Doubt’s small whimpers of pain.

“Where have you been, Lucifer?” the Voice came from the Light.

“Wandering too and from in the Earth.” I carefully replied. Darkness accompanied my deep voice, tinged with disdain. I did what I could not to show my discomfort at walking in the Light. I would have much rather put on a pair of black sunglasses to simultaneously aid my vision as well as give a visual statement as to my mindset.

“Have you considered my friends at the School of StarryHost? They study about My works in Science and see what I have done in them.”

“Yes, Lord,” I replied sardonically. “But they are not confused by Doubt because you protect them. You reign in their hearts and in their minds and therefore they walk in the Light. Give them to me for a time and we will see if they still recognize You in Your works.”

“You may have them for a time. But I do not give you their minds. Their free will to choose remains theirs and theirs alone.”

I smiled broadly. That’s quite enough I thought. Quite enough.

I turned my back on the Light and went out from His presence, Doubt and Fear in my wake.

Back in the elevator, I pressed the GROUND button. I carefully studied our human target far below us on the earth through the glass windows.